“I was just surprised, is all,” she finally said.
How odd.
Not one of my staff had concerned themselves thus far regarding my personal life, and even less so if it had to do with something outside of hospital policy.
What did they care what I got up to in my free time?
“Again, why?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s nice to see you... happy? Since that officer was discharged, you’ve been a little...”
I paused with my fork mid-way to my mouth. “A little what, Violet.”
She busied herself with scraping off the remnants of her yogurt from the inside of the lid with her spoon, dunking it down into the pink goop once she was finished to scoop up a spoonful and bring it up to her lips. “Upset, is how I would describe it, I guess.”
“Upset,”I repeated in disbelief.
She looked at me for only a brief moment before shrugging again, slipping the spoon past her lips to lick it clean. “Claudia says ‘pissy’ but I think underneath all of that, you were sad when he got discharged.”
How in the world was I supposed to respond to that?
Denial?
Dismissiveness?
Deflection?
If I knew calling up Terran after that god forsaken text message was going to get the nurses talking, I would’ve snuck out to the parking lot before doing my bed checks.
My fault for taking the easy road by ducking into the locker room instead. Impatience had won out, impulsivity taking over at the mere hint of Terran occupying his time with someone else. Ridiculous, considering I wasn’t at all obligated to care who else he was seeing. He was young, barely into his adult years.
It shouldn’t matter so long as it didn’t get in the way ofourtime together.
Rookie mistakes on both ends of the spectrum: taking a personal phone call where anyone walking by would overhear whatever was being said, and letting myself get riled up over some innocuous comment made by someone I was sleeping with.
He drove me nuts, as did my nursing staff.
My fork practically bent in half with how hard I slammed it down into the pile of pasta gathered on my plate. “I wasn’t aware I was the topic of gossip.”
Why thefuckwould he insinuate seeing someone else?
She scooped up another spoonful. “You’re our direct higher-up. Of course we talk about you.”
Annoying. Irritating. Vexing me with petty speculations about things they had no business talking about.
“I wasn’t upset.” In actuality, I was pissed.
Pissed at him for getting into my head. Pissed at him for invading my life and enticing my friends into needling me about making nice with their fucking partners. Pissed that I was now fucking hooked hard enough to actually refuse overtime on Wednesday just to see him.
Sending him a driver to pick him up like a date to a ball. Bringing him out to another nice restaurant in some grand effort to woo him before bringing him back to my place to fuck him senseless. Gifting him a two hundred thousand dollar piece of jewelry so that every time he moved, he felt the metal tug against his skin and was reminded of me.
All for what?
Seeing him in more skimpy little outfits that would absolutely rot my brain again?
I was better off watching porn and getting off that way. It would curb me from ever finding myself in a situation where I let someguyinvade my mind more times than my daily reminder on my calendar to eat three meals a day.
I hated that stupid little twisted up expression he got right before he came. I hated the way he grabbed onto me, pulling me closer, and those small, gasping breaths that left him with each thrust.
